Gardening for Dummies: Companion Planting {Free Printable}

SPRING is here (in my neck of the woods), and it’s time to get the garden ready! I am on year four of my desert garden adventure, and things just keep getting better! Now that I have learned (through trial and error) what grows well in the desert, I’m ready to focus on what plants help each other in the garden. Want to learn, too? I thought you might!

Instead of just randomly placing my plants in the garden (which I have done in the past), I decided to find out which plants should and should not go together. I found a fantastic resource at WestCoastSeeds.com. I’ve linked you to a document about companion planting.

I had a really hard time keeping track of the twenty-four different plants I want to include in my garden. To keep it all straight, I created this companion planting chart and planned my square foot garden boxes based the chart. I hope it helps you decide what to plant as well.

It’s pretty simple: Green means GO, and red means STOP! If the chart says green, the plants work well together. If the chart says red, the plants don’t work well together. Easy peasy! (Now’s the time where my dad pipes in and explains that charts can’t really talk. Thanks, Dad.)

I also found great info about plants that repel garden bugs. I created a chart for that, too!

Heidi thanks for the great post! The companion planting guide is a huge help! It’s been in the 30’s here and a snow storm is on the way for Sunday. I can’t wait for warm weather so that we can get out in the yard.

Thanks so much for all the great gardening ideas I’ve found on your blog today! I’ve been pinning like crazy.

Companion Planting: How close do the plants need to be in order to get the benefits? (Or how far do they need to be from each other to avoid the negative effects?) I just have a 4×4 square, with some additional vertical plants on one side. Is my garden too small to worry about companions?

I replied to Ruth via email, but I thought you all might like to hear the answer. I am not a gardening expert. I learn more and more every year, but I don’t know enough yet to answer this question. I suggested that Ruth visit or call her local nursery to find the answer.

As for me, I think no garden is too small to worry about companion planting–especially things that should not be planted close together.

Great chart and great idea. There are a couple of errors on the chart though, in case you want to fix them. If you follow chives on the left to peppers on the top and then go the other way peppers on the left to chives along the top, it is not the same color code. Also if you do the same for squash to broccoli and squash to cauliflower and then the opposite way. If you fold the page up the diagonal, the pattern should be exactly the same. The lady that first noticed on facebook said there are some “good” combos that don’t match as well.

It’s a great idea and great resource so thought I would share the difference in case you wanted to fix the chart.

Hi Heidi! I couldn’t leave without saying thank you for all the work you put into creating this wonderful resource! I am a volunteer for our local school garden and I will definitely be sharing your post with our teachers. I’m also a blogger, although I haven’t been writing much lately, and I have a half-done post on Square Foot Gardening that I would love to link to your post as well when I finally get it done. (Moving from Michigan to SoCal has made it a bit hard to finish… I miss my garden!)

That is so sweet of you to say, Rachel! I’d love to see your square foot gardening post. I’m afraid that I spent too much time blogging and not enough time tending the garden this summer. Most plants did okay, but I had some totally fail because I let the bugs get them! I’ll do better next summer!

I’m off to check out your site. Thanks again for leaving such an encouraging comment!

Thank you so much for posting this! I have been reading about companion planting and trying to keep everything straight, but this chart makes it so much easier. Thanks for putting the work into it and sharing it!

Oh wow, this is really helpful! I had a little balcony garden last year, and some of my plants didn’t do that well. I think I’ll probably stick to herbs this year, because we’ll be moving late spring/early summer, and those will be easier to move to our new home.

This is brilliant! We sprinkled a packed of wildflower seeds in our garden last year and they completely took over the place. We just spent a day pulling them all up and now I need to find something else to plant in the beds. I’ll be studying this chart later!

Do not believe every one of these charts. For example, this show that peas and beans (nitrogen fixers) are good companions for strawberries. However, strawberries are light feeders during the season. If they get too much nitrogen, they produce too much foliage which shades the fruit and results in less, and less sweet, fruit. We need to use our common sense about this.

I can confirm that dill does NOT repel aphids. The worst garden aphid infestation I’ve ever experienced was when I planted dill. They were sucking the life out of it. But then the ladybug larvae showed up and decimated the aphids! I guess how dill works as a companion plant is that it attracts aphids to itself and hopefully they don’t notice the rest of the plants? LOL.

Oh boy…I got some rearranging to do! :) I just do the container garden…so easy to move containers around…but wow….seems like everyone doesnt like someone! Haha…this is going to be like musical chairs! :) Thank you for the fantastic info!!!

Thanks for the printable! Companion planting is of a great help to people who want to discourage harmful pests without losing the beneficial allies. I started last year with planting a Three Sisters garden and then came the idea of companion planting. I think that was the best choice I’ve made for my garden. Greets!

I like your article very much because you have posted on a very important thing i see people posting on technology , gadgets and many more things but i love articles like this who always strive to aware people regarding to the care of environment . i think everyone should try gardening as plant as many as trees they can because now a days people look to the cut the plant more rather then growing them … kudos to you !